Present invention embodiments relate to configuring computing environments, and more specifically, to assessing the impact of changes to computing environments described by environment specification documents.
An environment specification document describes one or more elements of a computing environment. A full-stack environment specification document is an environment specification document that describes a full-stack computing environment, including infrastructure (e.g., computing systems, storage volumes, networks, etc.), optional middleware (e.g., database management system, web server, etc.), and one or more applications. A virtual full-stack environment may be created (e.g., on a cloud computing system) from a full-stack environment specification document using orchestration tools (e.g., HEAT, etc.) to configure the virtual architecture and automatic software deployment tools (e.g., IBM UrbanCode Deploy, Chef, etc.) to deploy middleware and applications. Each environment specification document may include other environment specification documents (e.g. to describe components of the environment). Environment specification documents may be versioned, shared, and managed like source code. Any element of a running virtual environment may be updated by changing the document used to create it and applying the changed document to the environment. However, applying changes may adversely impact services provided by the environment. The effect of changes may be difficult to predict because of potentially complex chains of dependencies among environment specification documents, environments created from them, services provided by those environments, and the value of those services.